Unfortunately, on foreign policy the Democrats and Republicans don't care about public opinion.

Roughly 58% of the US public oppose the Afghan war, the Democratic and Republican duopoly didn't even allow it to be an election issue last November, and Hillary Clinton came out after the election and said that elections won't change foreign policy (talk about arrogant).

The Democrats and Republicans get away with it because most Americans refuse to vote outside the duopoly.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/11/03/hilary-clinton-election-w_n_778158.html

I certainly will participate, but I will not hold my breath in hopes that any of our ruling class policy-makers will even notice.

On February of 2003, millions of people took part in a global protest of W's plan to invade Iraq. I helped plan and worked security for the protest in Houston, Texas, which drew an astonishing 6,000 people. Estimates of worldwide participation ranged from 8 million to 30 million, depending on the source.

Not only was this the largest anti-war protest in history, it was apparently the largest "focus group" in history, which is the way W referred to it as he dismissed its significance and announced his intention to go ahead with the invasion.

A little more than one month later, bombs rained down on Baghdad, and those of us who had fought so hard to prevent this atrocity were heartsick and horrified.

Of course I will participate in the protest on 1/1/11, as I will continue to use my words and raise my voice to protest my government's insane and destructive foreign policy. It is my First Amendment responsibility to do so.

But we're going to have to come up with some better strategies, because, as Progressive 101 points out, neither Dems nor Repubs are interested in what the American people think about these wars. They do not care about the threat to our security and the suffering and privation these wars are causing their fellow citizens. Much, much less do they care about the horror of war daily visited upon the innocent in the countries they are ravaging for their resources.

Sadly, I agree: I will participate in the calls but I hold little hope that our "leaders" will listen. I am on the Liberty-Candidates.org team and believe that electing liberty-minded Ron Paul type candidates is the only way to get this country back on track short of blood in our streets.

God bless us every one.

FWIW here's my recent letter to the editor, which was actually published:

Source of Our Probem

I was just reading about the situation in Haiti, where there is almost no sewage treatment for the entire population of the country, 10 million people. The sewage just runs down the streets and into the sea, or into the refugee camps. There is no money available for sewage treatment.

The situation was the same when I visited Afghanistan in March of this year; raw sewage was dumped into the Kabul River. In Baghdad I remember sewage would leak up through the asphalt and run down the street. There is no money available for sewage treatment in these places either.

Then I was reading that while the official unemployment rate in the U.S. is 9.8%, the true unemployment is 20%. There are no jobs for young people or veterans. 3 million houses will be foreclosed on this year; that means 6-9 million people will lose their homes. There is no money available to help these people.

Meanwhile, the U.S. government has spent a trillion dollars killing paupers in Iraq (which is now aligned with Iran and just signed an oil deal with China) and Afghanistan, and those wars are forecast to cost a total of five trillion dollars. The U.S. is bankrupting itself and impoverishing the world, for no reason whatsoever.

If you are aware of all this, and still persist in funding this insanity, you aren’t part of the problem, you are the problem. Funding this mayhem is your fear-driven choice, to the detriment of your own children, and of all children. Remember, you yourself are a child of the universe, not a slave to the U.S. government; you are free to act according to your own highest ethical standards.

Sincerely,

Dana Visalli